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DEF Delight or not??

JLarson

Senior Member
Joined
Aug 23, 2020
Messages
656
Location
AZ
Occupation
Owner- civil and heavy repair/fab company
Yep they know the people who actually bought and work the equipment everyday don't want that crap on their equipment so they know they can make easy money cracking down.
 

JLarson

Senior Member
Joined
Aug 23, 2020
Messages
656
Location
AZ
Occupation
Owner- civil and heavy repair/fab company
They, aka the government, the ones that take your hard earned money and then give it to people that didn't earn it.
 

BigWrench55

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 11, 2018
Messages
1,176
Location
Somewhere
Yesterday I found a good reason not to delete.
Before the artic blast I had diagnosed a A25G Volvo truck with bad injectors. I had used my laptop and some physical troubleshooting to help me determine what the problem is. At that time the customer hadn't deleted the teir4 final. I came back this week to install the new injectors and injector cups. I installed the injectors and wrote down the trim file numbers. I then went to connect my laptop to upload the trim files and my laptop wasn't able to connect to the engine ecm. I did some looking around and discovered that the customer has deleted the teir4 final. The delete is blocking my software from communicating with the engine. So now I can't upload the trim files or do anything else for that matter. Usually having the previous trim files will not create problem, but the potential is there. So basically the customer paid 8k parts and labor and will get no warranty. If one of the injectors melts down a piston it is the customers problem. Also if any further issues should arise I will not be able to effectively troubleshoot the problem thus costing the customer more time and money. I make good money because of teir4 and I will admit that it's problematic. But most of the teir4 final woes are customer driven. Excessive idling, contaminated def fluid and fuel. Canceling regeneration and not running the machine hard and long enough. So if you're considering a delete then think twice. Because once you do you are in a grey area where dealer support is nonexistent.
 

John C.

Senior Member
Joined
Jun 11, 2007
Messages
12,865
Location
Northwest
Occupation
Machinery & Equipment Appraiser
It's not a gray area at all. It's as black and white as can be.

I was at a customer site this week and we were talking about older machines versus newer machines. The supervisor there said they had less problems with the older stuff when a young fellow listening in piped up that he liked the new stuff. I asked him why and he replied that the emissions stuff keeps him employed.
I was there to do an inspection on and excavator and there was the dealer's field service guy there changing out a DPF. He told me that there was no codes, the dealer was changing it out before there were problems that might cause down time on the machine. I asked him how much that costs. He said it was free to the customer. The machine had more than 6K hours on it.
 

BigWrench55

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 11, 2018
Messages
1,176
Location
Somewhere
By grey area I mean that you can still have the dealer come and do repairs, but there is no guarantee. And if I can't communicate with the engine or perform other diagnostic tests because the other ecm's don't know if the engine is running or not. Then I would have to resort to old school ways of troubleshooting which is time consuming. At 195 per hour wouldn't you want the mechanic troubleshoot faster? To each their own and its your dime. I personally don't care if you delete or don't. As long as I making money is all that matters to me.
 

Birken Vogt

Charter Member
Joined
Nov 30, 2003
Messages
5,305
Location
Grass Valley, Ca
Not a slam at owners. Some guys are just into moving dirt and don't want to know what goes on behind the curtain. They get a problematic DPF machine and want it deleted and somebody makes big promises and does it for them. Then it's a roll of the dice. Of course much of the time they just work properly after that happens. They don't call on machines that are working. Only when they have problems do they call and then it may be difficult for the mechanic. [Who is grouchy by nature.] But dollars and cents it is probably still more cost effective to delete a problematic machine and keep it working and pay some occasional increased diagnostic difficulty than to have to sell it or junk it because it becomes a problem child.

EPA fines aside. We have one way of doing things where I come from and that is the right way. EPA can wreck your day.
 

BigWrench55

Senior Member
Joined
Oct 11, 2018
Messages
1,176
Location
Somewhere
I'm working a piece of forestry equipment that ran without oil pressure, It had delete software in it and I wonder if that allowed it to run to the point of destruction.

I have heard of several horror stories involving deleted dodge truck's. All have lost oil pressure and grenaded the engine. I think that some of the delete software is merely tricking the ecm that everything is okay and when a failure occurs you won't know about it until it's too late. Because the ecm is programmed that all is well. The better deletes will include software from a non regulated market where there isn't teir4 regulations. But most of what I have seen are bully dog type software. In fact my brother in law deleted his 5500 dodge. At first he was pleased. More power and better fuel economy. But in the end with a little over 100k miles his engine is needing a overhaul. Basically what he has gained went back into the engine repair. He has replaced the engine and traded it in and said he won't delete this truck. He has a hotshot service and wants his trucks to get 3-500k if he can before replacing it.
 

Quint

Active Member
Joined
Feb 17, 2021
Messages
29
Location
WA
Problem with the Ram trucks and longevity after doing the D are generally either a very poor D programmer and or running hot tunes. Never heard of a 6.7 cummins losing oil pressure and grenading due to the Ds. Now they may do that just due to the inherent computer software, all the indications on them (oil pressure, oil temp, coolant temp ......) are computer algorithms and not necessarily the actual indications. If you want to see how big the difference is hook up a analog oil pressure gage and bounce that off the computer/dash indicated pressure. Most of the problems they have were due to head gasket failures from poorly written tunes.

They have refined the emissions enough to get similar fuel mileage but the cost of the emissions out of warranty is scary. In warranty most dealers initial response is bad def or ya didn't use mopar def so your SOL (which is totally inaccurate). The emissions system is not part of the powertrain warranty and has its own sectioned up mileage warranty depending on the part.
 

Midnightmoon

Senior Member
Joined
Nov 9, 2013
Messages
445
Location
Ny
You can run emulators to fool the ecm to thinking certain sensors are working as they should. A much better route then reflashing ecu and not being able to hook up to it for diagnostics of non deleted components. Issue I see with emulator is maintaining optimal back pressure so it doesnt run lean
 

Quint

Active Member
Joined
Feb 17, 2021
Messages
29
Location
WA
You can run emulators to fool the ecm to thinking certain sensors are working as they should. A much better route then reflashing ecu and not being able to hook up to it for diagnostics of non deleted components. Issue I see with emulator is maintaining optimal back pressure so it doesnt run lean

Why would a diesel need back pressure to keep from going lean? I don't see how that makes any sense at all.
 

Midnightmoon

Senior Member
Joined
Nov 9, 2013
Messages
445
Location
Ny
The ecm is tunned for the back pressure of the dpf. Remove the dpf and use a emulator to fool the ecm to thinking it's there and working you need to provide the same back pressure it had or it will run lean wont it?
 

Quint

Active Member
Joined
Feb 17, 2021
Messages
29
Location
WA
Not sure how they do it on the heavy equipment but would think its similar.
On trucks the duration and timing tables control the fuel and the only thing you have to worry about it making sure there is large enough exhaust to get rid of the exhaust for the increased fuel/air that gets used. Unless your going huge power its not usually a concern but most try to get as free flowing exhaust as possible.

If I remember correctly the DPF sensors are basically to enable a regen once the differential pressure gets to a certain threshold (and or put it in limp mode if its a truck). I dont recall what all is sensed on the SCR for control of the DEF injection or if that just gets fed inputs via the engine load and or relies on the nox sensors.

Edit: Got called off to work, anyhow wanted to add I am not sure about the emulation process. I am use to where they actually reprogram the computer to load new tables and disable the emissions related sensors and what not. As far as running lean its generally the intake side that effects that. More air (like a bigger turbo) without adjusting the fueling it goes lean or the opposite of adding bigger injectors without matching the correct turbo goes rich and ya get the unburned fuel (bunch of smoke).
 
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Mobiltech

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2014
Messages
1,681
Location
Sask.
Occupation
Self employed Heavy duty mechanic
Overfueling or rich is easy to do. Underfueling just gets low power not really considered lean.
 

Muffler Bearing

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 26, 2009
Messages
512
Location
Colorful Colorado
Occupation
Truck Mechanic
I don't know nuthin' 'bout pick up trucks, But I just plugged everything back together on this TigerCat. I tested the DEF pump, then I ran a regen and it looks like it passed just fine! Not what I expected. I don't know why they tried a half-assed delete in the first place, I guess over some burned harness? Seems like a lot of trouble for no gain
 
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